


The Hitchikers' Guide to the Guardians of the Galaxy

by Stardust_and_Strawberries



Series: Journey into Mishap [4]
Category: Marvel
Genre: Awesome Jane Foster, Canon-Typical Violence, Drax is not Stupid, Drunkeness, F/F, F/M, Fix-It, Polyamory, Science, Slurs, Thor Is Not Stupid, accidental misgendering, although I guess Drax is neurotypical for his planet, neurodiverse characters
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-03-22
Updated: 2016-08-04
Packaged: 2018-03-19 03:12:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 10
Words: 12,767
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3594219
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Stardust_and_Strawberries/pseuds/Stardust_and_Strawberries
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jane Foster and Thor are finally getting married! Most couples go a little crazy when they're ecstatically happy, unfortunately for these two going crazy involves knocking a hole in spacetime and marooning themselves and two of Jane's friends on a desolate and dangerous planet halfway across the galaxy. Meanwhile Darcy, Sif and Bill are trying to find them in Skuttlebutt.</p><p>Will they survive*? Will they make it to the wedding in time? Will Thor's attempts to communicate with Groot drive everyone crazy? Will Darcy get to witness Jane's brief Goth phase? Will Jane's friend Sayed get over his Star-Trek inspired fantasies about green-skinned alien women? Find out in the next exciting installment of Journey into Mishap!</p><p>*Spoiler: well yes, because they're my favorite characters.<br/>Series</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Errors of judgement

On reflection, thought Thor looking back on the evening of the party, the most embarrassing part had been that he was the only one drunk. Though he understood that Tony Stark had been much given to carousing and celebration in his youth, and indeed still played up to the role expected of him, he no longer imbibed. Jane's companions Sayed and Sylvie abjured alcohol as was required of them by the code of their faith, and Jane herself drank little and infrequently as she claimed alcohol did not agree with her constitution. Thor suspected that this was because she was small in stature even for the folk of Midgard, but would not have dreamed of sharing this theory with her after her response to the first instance when he had remarked upon her size.

It was commonly supposed that Thor could not get drunk. This was not entirely correct; in truth while it required such large quantities of mead it was rarely worth the effort, he was capable of becoming intoxicated if he chose to. However his powers allowed him to shake off the effects whenever he wished, and rare indeed was the occasion on which he was willing to allow his reactions to be dulled. Tonight was one such occasion -  happy in the company of his friends and the anticipation of his impending marriage to the incomparable Jane, he felt comfortable celebrating.

Thor settled himself behind Jane's desk to observe his beloved and her friends. He had swiped a flagon of mead ere he exited the common room, and this vantage point allowed him to conceal it behind a bank of monitors - although he had frequently explained that nothing in the laboratory could harm him Jane still forbade food or drink within on safety grounds. He was confident that he would be able to drink unobserved once her attention was absorbed though, a liberty he could never take in the presence of the good Doctor Banner who concerned himself even more with such matters.

Tony busied himself pawing through the equipment strewn upon the desk, exclaiming over anything that caught his attention. "How did you align the capacitors? Is this thing held together with tape? You should have said, I could build you a housing for it, red and gold, no problem, or would you prefer pink to match your shirt? What about this one? You know this board is obsolete right? You just need to ask Jane, it'd be no trouble to build you a better one! Jane? Jane! You've crosswired the terminals here! Oh no you haven't, wait, I see what you did, but that would be easier if you just..." Jane followed him, attempted to bat him away.

Thor cringed to recall that he had himself behaved in such a manner when first he came to Midgard, unaware of the importance of the items he had examined so thoughtlessly. "A little care please my friend." he pleaded. "A moment's clumsiness or inattention could do great damage."

"Brave words from a man with egg salad in his hair." said Tony, poking a probe into a clot of wiring and getting and getting an electric shock for his trouble. Jane's expression had turned murderous.

"Do you think that you should return perhaps to the party? To reassure Pepper that you are in fact not letting in people who are drunk to the lab?" asked Sylvie. Tony's eyed widened.

"Good point. You, now, you're my favorite." he called as he bolted, to Thor's relief. It would have been discourteous to pick the man up and remove him bodily from the lab, though he had been sorely tempted to do so. Turning to Jane he asked gravely "My love, do I really have egg salad in my hair?"

"Bend down so I can see...oh you do." Jane giggled. "Go and sort it out in the mirror at the eyewash station."

As he went to do as she bade him he heard Jane's guest exclaiming excitedly at the cleverness of the machinery in her laboratory. This pleased him. The Lady Sylvie and the Lord Sayed were not only his beloved's bosom companions from her years in Midgard's halls of learning, but were themselves skilled practitioners of Midgard's esoteric arts of time and space. That they should recognize Jane's preeminence in the field was entirely proper.

"And this is the BiFoster itself?" he heard Sayed gasp reverently.

"Yeah, the protptype, I mean it can't stay open for very long and I haven't got the detail of the targeting system quite right yet I can really only open it to somewhere else on Earth so far but..."

"But that's such a minor thing! Now you've cracked the intersection algorithm for n-dimensional sub-iridis space you could open it to anywhere! You could go to another planet!"

"It's hardly minor guys, sure there's nothing physically stopping me from opening it on another planet but until I have a proper targeting matrix I could open it in the middle of a volcano or something. Or even miss the planet entirely and just open it in deep space somewhere!"

"I was just hoping we could maybe see another planet tonight." sighed Sayem.

"It remains a remarkable feat!" roared Thor. "What she has achieved in these short years has taken the scholars of other civilizations aeons to discover! I have no doubt that given a few years more she shall surpass the wisdom of the sages of Asgard!"

"Hush dear." said Jane, blushing but unable to entirely suppress her pride.

"We know, we have read her Nature paper." said Sylvie, smiling.

"Thor read it too! And it was in a foreign language for him!" Jane pointed out. Sylvie, whose first language was French, said nothing.

"I have no doubt that you understood a great deal more than I." said Thor in absolute sincerity.

"It's such a shame though that such a small thing as the targeting system is holding you back." said Sayed ruefully. Thor was growing annoyed with the man. Could it really be that only the sight of another realm would impress upon him the magnitude of Jane's achievements?

"There is always the Lady Sif's gift?" Thor ventured, gesturing to it. Everyone turned to look at the bench, on which rested a small, intricately carved box of honey-colored wood. The rune Vegvísir adorned the lid, inlaid in a silvery metal across which flickery reflections shimmered, seeming not to correspond to movements in the room.

"The Soul Compass? Lady Sif got it for me, as a betrothal gift. It works...well it works by magic really but I'm getting a handle on translating that into our terms." explained Jane. "It was very sweet of her but I didn't want to use it because, well, it would kind if be cheating you know? This isn't the Asgardian BiFrost, this is Earth technology built with Earth science and I'll have an Earth navigation system sorted out soon too I know it!"

Sayed sighed sadly. "I suppose it's fine for you, you can just visit another planet any time you want can't you?"

Jane looked uncomfortable. "Look maybe we can just do it once with the Asgardian spell if it matters so much. But it's not just the targeting, we'd have to beef up the containment field so if it did open in space we wouldn't be sucked into the vacuum. And the lab's reactor doesn't have the power for that, we'd have to hook it up to the tower's main arc reactor and that would take hours!"

"Perhaps I might be able to help?" offered Thor, and something in his face, his eagerness to help and to see her impress her friends, melted her resistance.

"Well maybe we could just this one time..."

"How much power will be required? I could fetch Bill to assist us..."

"No, no! You'll be fine on your own! We just was to charge the machine, not fry the planet."

"A moment please, to fetch Mjolnir!" called Thor as he bounded out of the door. Sylvie shot Jane a puzzled look.

"He seems very enthusiastic no? He is drunk? That can happen?"

"Quite possibly." Jane smiled indulgently. "He's been drinking his mead hiding behind that computer where he thinks I can't see him."


	2. Sif's gift

An unfortunate consequence of unleashing his full magic was that Thor found himself abruptly and unwelcomely sober. Even as he channeled the power of the storm into the apparatus he found himself wondering if this was such a great idea, or whether there may have been some good reason that Jane hadn't tried this before.

 

"I SAID THAT'S ENOUGH NOW!" screamed Jane as lightning crackled and spat around him. Responding more to her expression than what he'd managed to hear of her words, he calmed the storm's energies and reluctantly the storm allowed itself to be dissipated. He drifted back in through the lab window, coiling the power cable as he came. Sylvie and Sayed were watching, rapt.

 

"Mmm, containment field's looking good, can you bring the detector over?" said Jane, chewing her lip as she hammered at one of the keyboards. Thor carefully wheeled the detector into position, aligning the front wheels of the trolley with the lines Darcy had Sharpied on the lab floor. It bore a striking resemblance to a washing machine drum with wires fed through the drainage holes. Tony would have been horrified to learn that this was because it had in fact started life as precisely that.

 

A pale light began to gleam from the delicate filigree rune on the Soul Compass's lid, as though the artifact were excitedly anticipating being used. Jane took a moment to run through her calculations in her head, ensuring that the correct factors had been introduced to compensate for the delay between Asgardian and Earth equipment, and opened the lid. A shimmering galaxy of light unfolded out of the box, frosting the air of the lab with suns and nebulae of every color of the rainbow.

 

"My God, it's full of stars!" gasped Sayed. Sylvie elbowed him in the side, hard.

 

When the Lady Sif had first presented Jane with the Soul Compass, Thor had assumed she would find it difficult to use. I underestimated her, the same mistake my father made, he thought ruefully as he watched her manipulating the glowing rune filaments with the confidence of a sorceress trained in their use since infancy. While it was true that without magic she couldn't create the enchantments herself, it had taken but a little instruction for her to divine the correspondence of Asgardian techonology to her own, and the computer programs she had written allowed her to read the runes as easily as he could when the interface was not so intuitive.

 

"So where to you want to go?" asked Jane, the sparkle of the galactic map reflected in her eyes.

 

Sylvie and Sayed stared at each other? "There?" she ventured at last, pointing to a spot at random close to the galactic hub.

 

With a flick of her hands Jane enlarged the area she was pointing at, dismissing the rest of the map. "Okay Sayed's turn. Choose a star system." Another twist of her hands and the system he pointed at came into focus, this time overlaid with twining strings of data. Jane frowned, concentrating. "Okay so it looks like the fourth planet has an atmosphere like Earth, uninhabited... Let's go!" Another hand gesture and the image collapsed into a sphere of spooling runic data. A well-practiced flick slam dunked the sphere into the belly of the detector.

 

"Everyone stand back now."

 

As they watched the universe seemed to shift, reality falling downwards and inwards, collapsing to a point of pure wrongness that somehow hurt to look at hovering above the area of floor marked out with electrical tape. A sudden lurch and the portal irised open, revealing a dusty brown landscape surrounded by a shimmering halo of rainbow light.

 

"So yeah, that's my portal." said Jane, beaming.

 

"It looks close enough to touch!" gasped Sayed.

 

"It's not, the distortion caused by the lensing effect..." Jane started to explain as Thor watched the humans with some envy, their rapt expressions illuminated by the portal's flickering corona, wondering if the first Aesir to travel between the stars had felt the same sense of awe at something that was now so mundane to him.

 

"Another planet! Another world! It's so close! In fact...." Sayed grabbed a spanner from a nearby tool box before anyone could stop him and thrust it into the portal "...I can....oh."

 

The spanner somehow fell for much longer than the apparent distance it had to travel would have justified, trailing polychomatic afterimages, before hitting the ground in a rather anticlimactic puff of dust.

 

"I didn't mean to let go." whimpered Sayed as the others stared at him. Jane blew out an exasperated breath and jumped.

 

She closed her eyes as she fell. As frustrating as it was to deliberately ignore new data, experience had taught her that human senses weren't designed to perceive the shapes and sensations of the void between dimensions and trying to do so would just result in a nasty case of motion sickness. One day she would optimize a piece of equipment to record these data, and then spacetime would finally yield its secrets to her. She could afford to wait a little longer if it meant not vomiting on the feet of the first person she met on a new world.

 

Landing blind, Jane stumbled when her feet met the planet surface and was surprised to be caught by strong hands. Snapping her eyes open she spun round to find Thor behind her.

 

"What are you doing here?"

 

"You jumped into a portal to an unknown world!"

 

"We can't just go leaving human technology all over new planets! It could interfere with the development of alien civilizations! Plus it's littering." she grumbled, picking up the spanner.

 

"Yes, but it could be dangerous?"

 

"Thor, does anything here look like a threat to you?"

 

Trying not to smile Thor scanned the barren landscape before pointing Mjolnir at a small lizard-like creature on the ground. With an angry "Chakchakchak!" noise the little creature erected a fleshy crest on its neck and shoulders, before thinking better of it and disappearing with a whip of its tail.

 

"There, you see?" he said triumphantly. "The Mighty Thor has vanquished the threat to your safety."

 

Jane giggled. "I'd have been a goner wouldn't I? I'm so lucky to have you to protect me from tiny wildlife."

 

Thor raised a hand to cup her cheek, his ice-blue gaze suddenly becoming intense. "We are to be married Jane. Wherever you go I shall follow."

 

"Thor...I...." Jane rested her hand on his as she rose up on tiptoes to kiss him, her own eyes saying everything she couldn't find the words to express. They leaned closer until...

 

...a cellphone appeared between their faces. "Can you take a picture of us on the alien planet?" asked Sayed chirpily. Behind him Sylvie smacked her face with her hand.

 

"Umm, yeah, sure, didn't realize you'd come too." muttered Jane, fumbling the phone in the same hand as the spanner. Thor sighed.

 

"Get as much of the sky in as possible!" called Sayed, bounding over to his wife who scowled and hissed "They were having a moment!" Jane took a few pictures of Sayed making victory signs while Sylvie frowned at him.

 

"Anyway, we should probably head back to the party. Can you imagine how awkward it would be if we got stuck here now?" she said.

 

On cue, the portal collapsed.


	3. Stranded

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter contains a discussion of hunting for food, so you might want to skip it if you don't like that sort of thing

"So, how do we reopen it from this side?" asked Sylvie.

Jane swallowed. "We...don't. We can't."

Sylvie nodded. "I thought you would say that, but I had to ask."

"But it's okay, we'll just hitch a ride on a passing starship!" Jane continued hurriedly.

"Indeed. Close as we are to the Core we should not have to wait long for a suitable vessel." said Thor.

"And there's plenty of firewood and Thor can make it rain any time anyone's thirsty."

Sylvie closed her eyes in the hope that when she reopened them this would no longer be her reality. While she was distracted Sayed saw his chance.

"How do we call a starship?" he gasped breathlessly.

Jane held up her phone. "With this."

It had started life as an off-the-shelf Starkphone, if a top of the line model, and the array of sensors included had persuaded Jane that this could be as useful tool instead of just an annoying communication device that wasn't worth the time to learn to use. She had steadily upgraded the software, processing power and hardware with her usual blend of Duck Tape and determination until she had something close to a working tricorder. In despair Tony had offered her an array of miniaturized components, protesting that Stark technology had a reputation for elegance and a brick with wires sticking out was bad for his image, and she had explained that she preferred tech she built herself because it was easier to modify when she needed to.  She was only persuaded to miniaturize it slightly when Thor pointed out that it still needed to fit in her pocket, or at the very least her bag.

"Dammit, my battery's nearly dead. Sorry, could you...?"

"Of course." Jane snapped the battery out of her phone and handed it to Thor, who carefully positioned his thumbs over the contacts and recharged it in seconds.

"Thank you. Please don't tell Darcy I asked you to do that."

"I really do not mind."

"But she's just taking advantage now. I don't think she even knows where her charger is anymore."

"What are we going to do about food while we wait though?" Asked Sayed. Sylvie turned to him in astonishment.

"You ate half a pizza and three donuts just an hour ago!"

"But we'll just hungry soon!"

"Just a second." Jane rummaged in her pants pocket and triumphantly produced a drooping Clif bar. She brandished it at the other three, one of whom was Thor. "Uh, I guess this won't go so far between all of us."  
   
"There is game?" Thor suggested. He gestured at a squabbling huddle of what looked like gray, undernourished pterosaurs and pulled a throwing knife from his boot.

"You brought a knife to a party?" Sylvite gasped, astonished.

"Of course?"

Jane sighed. "Believe me it's a perfectly sensible precaution. This sort of thing happens every week round here."

Thor hefted the knife experimentally. "Beloved, if you could start the fire. These beasts should not take long to prepare."

"But we won't be able to eat them!" protested Sayed. Thor turned to look at him curiously.

"They won't be Halal, you're not Muslim so you can't speak the name of God over the knife when you throw it." Sylvie explained. "But if you are hungry, don't let us stop you."

Thor flipped the knife in his hand and offered her the handle. Sylvie put up her own hand to decline.

"Oh no no no, I wouldn't even know how. But a follower of another religion of the book could. Jane?"

"Whoah whoah whoah, culturally Jewish only. And I'd probably just throw it at my own foot or something. But you know Thor was worshipped as a god once? Does that count?"

Sylvie sighed. "Don't be facetious Jane."

Thor offered the knife to Sayed, who muttered "I could try?" in a tone that made it clear it was the last thing he wanted to do.

Jane groaned. "Sweetie, you do know that most humans can't actually throw a knife that accurately right? Nat and Bucky are kind of exceptional."

Thor paused to digest this new information. "Clint can too?" he ventured at last.

"Oh no no no, please don't take anything Clint does as representative of normal human behavior. You'll run into so much trouble that way!"

Thor shrugged and eyed the birdlike creatures huddling under their leatthery wings speculatively. "Do you even know they're safe to eat?" asked Jane.

"Very little can harm my Aesir physiology...." began Thor, as one of the creatures met his gaze and vomited up milky white fluid with a disgusting retching noise.

"...although on reflection, I am not as hungry as I thought I was." The revolting sound continued. Thor very slowly returned the knife to his boot.

"Okay never mind, let's just set the beacon up and get a fire going." said Jane. She picked a pair of wires out of her phone with her thumbnail as Thor hefted Mjolnir.

"Okay, so let's try the same frequency as last time." She muttered, handing him the phone. He nodded, unwinding the leather strap to secure the contacts.

"You use the hammer?" asked Sylivie.

"To amplify the signal." explained Jane. "Thor has complete control over Mjolnir's properties, physical, chemical, nuclear, everything. He can make it mimic any material, even theoretical ones."

"So can he make it edible?" asked Sayed. Three pairs of eyes stared at him in abject horror. "What? I just thought it was important to ask. I take it that's a no then?"

"Mjolnir was forged in the heart of a dying star!" said Thor in a strangled voice. "It resonates with the very forces of creation itself! It is the focus and the arbiter of my power!"

"A definite no then?"

"I'm so very sorry about this." muttered Sylvie.

Thor placed Mjolnir and the phone on the ground, shooting Sayed a suspicious glare in case he decided to try eating the hammer after all.

"Okay let's get a fire going and try and get some sleep then." said Jane, gazing at the alien sun overhead. "Sayed, why don't you and Sylvie go and collect some firewood?" She put her arm round Thor, who looked deeply unsettled. "He wouldn't really have tried to eat your hammer." she whispered to him.

"It is not that which concerns me."

"No?"

"My love, I fear that I am to blame for our current predicament. Certainly you had good reason to defer testing your device until all was better prepared, and I was too impatient to see it demonstrated."

"Honestly? I've been looking for an excuse to try that for ages and you gave me one. Let's not worry too much about whose fault this is okay, let's just focus on getting back. Deal?"

"Deal."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I wrote a fair bit of this on my phone and autocorrect seems to have decided Sylvie isn't a real name for some reason. It kept switching it to Slyvia, I think I spotted them all but if you see any I missed please let me know.


	4. Surveillance

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm so sorry it's been so long guys! The real world has been kicking my arse lately but I hope to be updating more frequently in future.

"Jane? Jane. Awake my sweet!"

Jane made a snuffling noise and attempted to burrow into Thor's armpit.

"Jane, there is a ship!"

"Whuuuu?"

"A spaceship!"

Jane dragged her reluctant brain into something resembling consciousness. "The beacon worked?"

"Possibly." said Thor awkwardly, shifting his body so Jane wouldn't see that the phone had come loose from Mjolnir where he hadn't attached it properly. "In any case we should investigate. Do you see? It appears to be heading for that ridge."

Jane narrowed her eyes against the alien sun, which was now much lower in the sky than when they had gone to sleep. "Yeah, I can just see it. Guys! Guys wake up! There's a spaceship!"

"I can't believe we might be travelling in an actually spaceship! A starship! What class is it?" called Sayed excitedly, as his wife adjusted her headscarf and muttered something about being on an alien planet already.

"Class?"

"Yeah you know, spaceships must have classes? Like Galaxy Class, Defiant Class, Ambassador Class...?"

"It's, uh, small?"

"Very small." confirmed Thor. "We should make haste, we do not know how long they intend to remain on this world. Will you fly with me?"

"I thought you'd never ask." said Sylvie, ignoring Sayed's sour expression.

***

They arrived on top of the ridge undetected in spite of Sayed's shrieking at the unexpected speed. Leaving him clinging to the ground while Sylvie comforted him Jane and Thor crawled to the edge to watch the craft. In the gathering dusk Jane switched her phone to night vision and magnified the scene  below him while Thor relied on his own eyesight.

The hatch of the ship gaped open smoothly for a few feet and then stopped abruptly. There was a pause for several minutes, then the sound of hammering, then another pause before finally a small explosion propelled it fully open. It threw up a cloud of dust as it hit the ground and lay at a slightly skewed angle.

As the dust dissipated the watchers saw a humanoid figure arguing with a smaller creature in yellow overalls holding some sort of blaster. Jane frowned and adjusted her phone.

"Is that a raccoon?"

Thor squinted. "It seems unlikely, I understood them to be indigenous to Midgard and this one is clearly sentient. And angry." he added as the smaller figure kicked the hatch then threw down the blaster to clutch its foot. The larger being flung his arms down in a clear expression of disgust and stalked back inside the ship.

"What about the other one?" asked Jane. "Human or Asgardian? Or something else?"

"No Asgardian would willingly travel in a craft like that." scoffed Thor, then remembered himself. "I apologise. It is impossible to tell from this distance. Curious is it not how closely many of the species of our galaxy resemble one another?"

"Sayed would tell you some theory he got from Star Trek about one ancient species seeding the galaxy because they were lonely." said Jane. "Wait, your people didn't actually do something like that did you?"

Thor shook his head. "More of my peoples' knowledge of our origins was lost when we fled our first homeworld than we care to admit. It would damage our reputation of great power and knowledge in the galaxy. Yet I understand that my species is younger than yours, though our lifespan is greater." He looked away, lost in thought. "There is a saga told to children, that the Asgardians were created when a being not unlike the humans of Midgard fell in love with an elemental, and created children with their father's form and a measure of their mother's power."

"You never told me that before! Do you think there's any truth in it?"

"I do not know, yet in my gut I feel there is - my people generally hold those they see as weak in so little regard it would surprise me if a saga was created saying we originated as such. Yet I do not know, perhaps I wish it to be true. I always enjoyed that tale." He smiled at Jane. "That two such different beings could find love together." Jane shifted her weight to lean against him and his kissed the top of her head.

While they had been talking the raccoon-like creature had finished nursing his sore foot and was now scrabbling at the hinge mechanism of the hatch. A much larger silhouette now appeared behind him. They watched a muscular gray-skinned humanoid emerge and drop an enormous tool box on the ground before starting to pry a panel off the ship's exterior. Thor squinted at him.

"Interesting. Although he appears to be acting an an engineer aboard this vessel his adornments identify him as a member of the warrior caste. Indeed if I do not mistake the markings he is a member of the elite cadre known as Destroyers. May I?" Jane nodded and handed him her phone. "He is a Destroyer! And one of a wedded pair at that! If you could only see them in battle Jane, truly a matched pair of Destroyers is a spectacle to behold! I doubt we shall have a chance to witness it, but still, I do hope his spouse is female. Female Destroyers fight with a graceful savagery that is quite..." he noticed Jane grinning at him. "...well perhaps you may not appreciate it so much, but still, I find it instructive to watch." he huffed. Jane gave his arm an affectionate squeeze, then felt him stiffen under her grasp.

Another crew member had appeared, a green-skinned humanoid of female appearance. "What's wrong?" Jane whispered, unconsciously lowering her voice even further. "Help me enlarge the image Jane, I must be certain." Thor whispered back, handing her the phone. She scrabbled frantically at the screen before handing it back and nodding grimly. Below them the green figure said something to the Destroyer and they disappeared behind the ship together.

"What is it Thor? Do you recognise her?"

"Aye, that I do. That is Gamora herself, the Dagger of Thanos, the deadliest assassin of the mad Titan himself." Thor looked deeply concerned. "I am not certain even I am a match for her, though I relish the chance to find out. Were I alone I should challenge her to combat. The bloody gash she has scored through the Galaxy must be brought to an end. Yet I have you and your companions with me, perhaps for your safety I should let her go without making her aware of her presence? Justice though demands that I do not." He looked deeply unhappy.

"We've talked about this so many times before. I know what I'm getting into remember? You don't need to treat me like some burden to protect, I want safety for the people of this Galaxy as much as you!"

"And your friends Jane? Can you speak for them? Would you risk sacrificing them too?"

"I..."

Jane never got to finish her sentence. Drax barrelled out of the shadows and tackled Thor, knocking them both off the cliff edge. It was the work of a moment to extricate himself from his opponent's grasp and leap back to the top, but by the time he reached Jane Gamora was holding a curved blade at her throat.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Also Gutterpigeon has done fan art for this series, go see it on the series description, it's awesome!


	5. Confusion

Thor landed and froze, cancelling his summons to Mjolnir with some effort.

"You will do exactly as I say Asgardian or I'll split her throat." said Gamora, holding Jane in an adamantium grip.

"Let me GO!" Jane shouted, squirming and scraping her heels down Gamora's shins. The former assassin didn't flinch but her eyes widened slightly in surprise. "Did you hear what I just said?" she asked, more in confusion than threat.

"Jane please, be calm, we can deal with this." Thor pleaded. Jane stilled but her expression remained furious. 

"Do you plan to attack us Asgardian?" demanded Drax.

"That would depend upon the intentions of the Dagger of Thanos!"

"Do not mock me, daggers do not have intentions!"

"He means me Drax." said Gamora, stepping forward and nudging a truculent Jane before her. Behind the Peter and Rocket came running across the plateau, their faces illuminated eerily from below in the fading twilight by the light of their blasters.

"I am no longer the puppet of Thanos, and now stand against everything he strives for." she declared, finishing the sentence by spitting on the ground.

"You expect me to believe that while your blade is at my companion's throat?"

"No Asgardian, I expect you to use your power to take what you wish and claim it is in the interest of protecting those you consider the lesser races."

"That's not true!" yelled Jane, kicking again much to Gamora's alarm. Only the former assasin's enhanced reflexes prevented Jane from cutting her own neck on the dagger. At this rate it would very quickly become obvious that she had no intention of really cutting her throat. "Silence!" she hissed.

"Please Jane!" begged Thor. "There are those in this galaxy who see my people thus, perhaps not entirely without reason." He narrowed his eyes. "I am not convinced though that the Sword Hand of Thanos is one such."

"Are you trying to confuse us with your nonsense? Hands cannot have opinions!"

"Yeah, uh, Manbun the Barbarian? Could you speak a little more plainly? He's not good at metaphors!" interjected Peter.

"Yes, answer us simply." snarled Drax. "Our scanners did not detect your vessel. Do you intend to kill us and take our ship?"

"Yeah!" growled Rocket.

"Let her go and you have my word you will not be harmed." said Thor.

"Don't worry about me, stop them if they're with Thanos!" yelled Jane.

Drax turned to Jane, astonished. "She told you that she is no longer in the service of Thanos!"

"She might be lying?" said Jane.

"Why would she do that?" asked Drax in bewilderment.

"Oh sweet Jesus." groaned Peter, slapping a hand over his face. Beside him Rocket whistled.

Further metaphysical discussions were postponed by the arrival of a floating platform at the cliff edge, propeled by wheezing, ancient repulsors. Thor took the merest instant to assess the situation and classify it as not posing a threat, before returning his attention to Jane's captors. Jane however was free to gape at the platform's pilot, which appeared to be a small plant in a pot with articulated robotic legs. The plant stepped off the platform onto the plateau, seemingly piloting its bizarre conveyance by means of a pair of levers on the rim of the pot.

Gamora got back to the business at hand. "We need a guarantee that you'll let us go if we release her."

"What do you suggest?" asked Thor.

"Let us turn the engine on you, we'll leave while you're regenerating."

"WHAT?" yelled Jane and Peter simultaneously. Gamora sighed, and explained as if to a very small child. "Asgardians are incredibly tough Peter. This one could probably take the whole ship down on his own. This way we get away with a head start. It won't do him any permanent damage."

"It...just seems a bit harsh that's all."

"Sounds good to me." said Rocket. "We should check his pockets before we toast him though."

"NO!" screamed Jane.

"But I mean, that has to hurt?" asked Peter.  
   
Gamora shrugged. "If you want to fight him go ahead. Maybe he's in the mood for a dance-off."

"Hey! That worked!"

They were interrupted by Sayed rushing out of the brush with the spanner raised over his head, letting out a scream of rage which segued seamlessly into a scream of terror as Drax grabbed his upraised wrist and simply lifted him off the ground.

"What should I do with this one?" asked Drax, at which point Slyvie darted out of the undergrowth and stabbed him in the bicep with her scarf pin. The effect wasn't entirely what she had expected - instead of making any sort of exclamation of pain he simply turned to stare at her in astonishment - but in the confusion Jane slipped free of Gamora and ran towards Thor, who took the opportunity to summon Mjolnir and his armor. For one awful moment he thought that Jane was actually going to try and stand in front of him to protect him, but she thought better of it and darted behind him.

"Let them go Destroyer!" Thor bellowed at Drax.

"You just let her get away!" Peter wailed at Gamora, who had produced another blade as if from nowhere and slipped into a fighting stance.

"If someone had been keeping a better watch perhaps the other two wouldn't have surprised us!" she hissed back.

"I am Groot!" interjected the pot plant.

"That's easy for you to say!"

"Hey! Primates! Is no one going to talk about the fact that that guy just grew armor and started sparking? Because I think that's a thing we should be talking about." Rocket snarled, keeping his gun trained on Thor.

Thor had indeed summoned Mjolnir and his armor and was standing in the centre of a maelstrom of lightning, but his eyes were on the plant.

"I am Thor?"

"I am Groot?? I AM GROOT!"

"Get real, how would you know a prince?" snorted Rocket.

"I am Groot!"

"I am Thor?"

"I am Groot." the plant said, gesturing at Gamora.

"I am Thor." he lowered Mjolnir and the lightning vanished, leaving fluorescent orange after impressions on Jane's retinas. 

"My lady, it appears I owe you an apology." He said, addressing Gamora. "Your companion has vouched for your story. Please allow me to introduce myself more civilly. I am Prince Thor Odinson and this is my consort, Professor Jane Foster. Our companions are Professor Sylvie Hatem and Doctor Sayed Hatem."

"It seems he has also vouched for you." said Gamora. Rocket nodded, looking rather disappointed there would be no looting after all.  
   
"Wait you know this guy?" asked Peter.  "Could you not have said that before?"

Groot shrugged apologetically. "I am Groot? I am Groot."

Rocket snorted. "I hear you buddy. Yeah, he didn't recognise you without your armour. All you monkeys look the same."

"So I should release the Asgardian's concubines?" asked Drax.

"We're not his concubines!" snapped Slyvie.

"Concubines are always female anyway!" said Sayed.

"Is that the case on your planet? How curious!" said Drax.

Gamora bit her lip and thought of the long hot bath she would have on the next planet they hit that had those facilities. And the large flagon of something alcoholic. "Yes Drax, please let them go."

Rocket was considering. "So Sparky here's a prince? As in an heir to a wealthy kingdom prince?"

"We would pay you for passage." said Thor, catching on.

"How much would you pay?"

"How much would you like?"

Gamora's gaze slid from Thor's face and over his shoulder. "How quickly can you get us in the air Rocket?"

"Twenty Divisions minimum."

"You have maybe one."

"Look I didn't just say that to sound impressive when I finish faster okay? If I say twenty I mean..."

"Start NOW Rocket! Everyone who can't fight get on the platform!"

Thor spun around as the first wave of aliens attacked.


	6. Swarm

They boiled out of the darkness in a writhing swarm, enormous worm-like creatures squirming and tumbling over one another in their eagerness for prey. Hexagonal maws at their front ends flared and gaped wide, revealing series rows of razor-sharp spines.

"I wonder if they really do have radial symmetry? Or if there's a bilateral axis we're not seeing?" mused Jane as Sylvie grabbed her arm and dragged her onto the floating platform with Rocket and Groot, Sayed close behind them. "I AM GROOT!". shrieked the diminutive pilot as he steered it over the cliff edge. There was a sickening moment of free fall as the repulsors adjusted to the suddenly greater distance below them, before the platform stabilized and began a controlled descent toward the Milano on the canyon floor.

They were mere feet from landing when Thor's glancing blow from Mjolnir flung one of the giant worms off the clifftop. It hit the ground to their left with a wet smack. Immediately a dozen others erupted out of the ground below to devour their stricken sibling.

"Change of plan!" shrieked Rocket, smacking the control panel with a tiny fist to propel the platform higher. One of the corner repulsors made a wining objection as they climbed then abruptly cut out, the sudden tilt flinging Rocket and a gun as large as he was into the air. Jane leapt to catch him before realizing she had nothing to land on.

Her fall was arrested with a jolt as someone grabbed her ankle, and she felt her friends scrabbling at her legs to pull her back. For a moment some irrational part of her brain panicked that they would pull her jeans off, before the more sensible part of her mind remembered that compared to falling face first into the worm pit losing her pants was the least of her worries. Rocket had somehow rotated in mid air and was now clinging to her wrist with pin-sharp claws even as she held his tail.

"Let go of me idiot, I'll help pull you back!" he snapped at her. Numbly Jane did as she was told and felt him scamper up her arm and back.

Hanging facedown from the platform she had a ringside view when the worm that had swallowed Rocket's blaster exploded in a pulse of eerie green light as the plasma cartridges discharged. But it was the way the other worms recoiled from the glow that intrigued her more...

"Thor! Get rid of the clouds NOW!" she screamed as her friends pulled her back to safety. Above them the clouds melted away as Thor did as she asked without waiting for an explanation.nstarlight from the glittering galactic hub pierced the night and bathed the scene in a silvery glow: the scientists on the platform, the Milano, the bewildered combatants and the worms frantically burrowing down into the dirt.

"They don't like the light, they only came out when the clouds covered the stars and it was completely dark!" she called to the others atop the cliff.

"It didn't get my gun back though. That was my second best gun!" Rocket whined.

Thor said nothing, but his smirk as he leapt from the cliff top to join them still managed to convey that his fiancée had just saved everyone's life.

Peter fired up his rocket boots. "Shall we?" he said, extending a hand to Gamora who snorted and climbed down the cliff face with spider-like agility. Drax followed her with considerably less grace but more enthusiasm and barely controlled speed. He hit the ground while Thor was still hovering, which is why he was the one who was engulfed when a worm exploded out of the ground where he landed.

"They're hiding just under the surface! Get on the ship NOW!" Gamora screamed as the platform half docked, half collided with the Milano's hatch, spilling scientists into the relative safety of her interior. Outside a patch of ground quaked and shook before suddenly sprouting Drax's hand, clutching a stone knife and dripping worm viscera. Gamora raced towards him, footfall almost impossibly light so as not to disturb the ground, and plunged a vicious curved dagger into the soil a few feet from his hand that set off another wave of convulsions in the ground. Peter shot a volley of covering fire at the nearby worms attracted by the commotion while Thor grabbed his wrist and pulled. A section of the beast's flank came too; Drax tore his way out, gasping for air.

"Set me down! Let me finish it!" he cried and Thor, respecting this display of warriorly zeal, did as he was told. As Drax raced towards what was left of the creature that had most dishonourably tried to make dinner of him Thor directed lightning bolts at the others as they braved the light above ground.

"Is that guy playing Whack-a-mole with lightning?" Peter called to Gamora.

"Cease babbling idiocies and shoot!"

***

The corridor shook as a worm thrashed at the Milano's hull.

"What do you mean you didn't charge the regenerator???" Rocket screamed.

"I am Groot!"

"Well find me the inverter then! I'll need to get a power pack out of something else, ex-atmo backup should..." he flipped down a wall panel, tiny paws scrabbling frantically through a tangle of components.

"Can we help?" asked Jane.

"Unless you monkeys can magically regenerate a fractured quantonium crystal in half a division no you cannot. Stay out of the way and be valuable cargo in case we get out of here alive."

"What's quantonium?" asked Jane.

"Hah! No you can't be helpful if you don't know it's the only thing on this |*|translator error: verb indicating explicit sexual activity with close biological relative|*| ship that can stabilise power to the flux drive!"

"Don't you have a spare?" asked Sylvie.

"Lady do you know how much those things cost?"

"See? That episode was not so stupid." said Sayed. Sylvie elbowed him in the ribs. "Not the time. Anyway the Federation doesn't use money."

"Okay that's what it does but what is quantonium?" asked Jane.

"' mmm Grt" Groot mumbled through a mouthful of tools and a holographic projection of its elemental structure appeared in front of her.

"This is Starkonium! My friend discovered it!"

"Flerkinshit unless your friend is eight thousand years old and from the Xr'frilllj'n system."

"No, he discovered it on my planet! Here, look! It powers my phone!" Jane snapped the back off to reveal a crystal of pure Starkonium. There was a moment's pause, punctuated by some rather grisly sounds from outside, before Rocket snatched the phone out of her hand and raced down the corridor yelling at Groot to prep for takeoff.

"Stay here!" Jane shouted at her friends, racing for the hatch. As she got closer she felt a vibration hum through the deck as the Milano's engines came back online. She grabbed one of the deck struts and skidded to a halt on the hatch, close enough to see the fighter's efforts to keep the worms away from the ship. "Thor! Guys! We're taking off!" As she said it she felt the ship start to rise.

Thor had been in a lot of these situations before, and knew that they usually ended in awkward and inconvenient arguments about who got to be the last to leave to protect the others. To avoid this tiresome outcome he caught Peter and Gamora up in one hand and hurled them through the hatch, confident that Gamora at least would land on her feet, and turned to look for Drax. As he did so though one of the creatures reared and lunged at Jane standing by the hatch.

Things happened too quickly for Jane to process. One moment she was ducking as Peter and Gamora came flying past her, the next she was staring past rank upon rank of teeth into a pulsating maw, an instant later she was wiping worm guts out of her eyes to see Thor was standing in front of her looking rather shocked. "My apologies my darling, I did not expect it to explode like that."

Jane laughed. "It's not a problem, I'd rather be alive and covered in who knows what than the alternative. I'd hug you to say thanks, but at least you managed not to get any on you."

Drax hauled himself through the bay doors beside them, dripping unmentionable fluids. "What a battle! What a glorious battle! What an honour to fight alongside you! To share this victory! It would be my honour to call you brother!" So saying he embraced Thor. There was an audible squelch.

"Thank you, I'm touched" said Thor weakly.


	7. Lost in Space

Drax detached himself from Thor, not without some unpleasant slurping noises, and walked over to Sylvie, pulling the scarf pin out of his arm as he went.

"This is yours." he said, handing it back.

"Thank you." she said, surreptitiously rubbing her hand clean on the back of her skirt. "I'm sorry that I stabbed you Drax, but you had my husband."

"No apology is necessary! If our positions had been reversed I would have done the same, but more lethally."

Thor and Jane squelched after him. "My love, the next time we are in combat together, could you perhaps refrain from placing yourself in danger..."

"What, like you did?"

"I am somewhat less vulnerable than you are..."

"They were going to put you through the engine!" shrieked Jane

"It would have hurt less than seeing you injured!" Thor yelled.

"Well that's just a-fucking-dorable, but can we talk about getting paid now?" sniped Rocket.

Thor and Jane separated reluctantly. "Yes of course."

Rocket's snout wrinkled as they approached. "You know it's airtight in this can right?"

"All cans are airtight, that is how they preserve food." explained Drax patiently.

"I mean you stink of dead monster." snarled Rocket.

"He's right. Drax, hit the shower, we'll see what we can do about clothes for these two." said Gamora.

"Are you sure? Last time I hit it it broke" he replied.

"They mean you should wash because you smell bad from the worm blood Drax. We all do, we'll shower after you." explained Jane.

"Why could none of you say that clearly?" Drax complained as he headed for the shower.

Gamora rubbed her forehead where her enhancements had started to ache with the stress.  "Are your garments made of organic fibers, Lady Jane?" she asked.

"I think so, why?" asked Jane, confused.

"I think they will need to go for reclamation."

"I can lend you some if you like." offered Peter.

"Alternatively, if you would prefer something that has been washed in the last twenty cycles, I could lend you some of mine."

"Harsh."

"Thank you, that would be very kind."

"Make sure you add the cost of the clothes to our bill!" interjected Rocket.

"And you Prince Thor? Something of Drax's might fit you..."

"Fortunately I have an alternative." Thor vanished his armor, replacing it with the clothes that he had worn to the party. They immediately became saturated with slime.

"Ah."

***  
   
"How much did you give them?" asked Jane, hopping on one leg as she peeled her jeans off."

"Twenty thousand units now, and another sixty when we reach Xandar. Which is not a problem." Thor added hurriedly before Jane had a chance to calculate the conversion.

Surprisingly the shower turned out to be large enough for both of them. Jane bundled her ruined clothes into the shiny reclamation pouch on top of Thor's and joined him in the cubicle. Tenderly she rested a hand on his chest, only to jerk it back immediately trailing tendrils of slime.

"This has to be the least erotic shower we've ever had together." she said, giggling.

"Verily." Thor chuckled, resting his forehead against hers.

***

Thor emerged wearing his armour, which was mostly clean now his party clothes had absorbed most of the slime. Jane shuffled awkwardly behind him, one hand tugging the hem of the extremely short burgundy leath skirt Gamora had lent her downwards.

Peter let out the beginning of a wolf-whistle, then awkwardly turned it into a whistled tune when Thor looked at him.

"Umm, sorry Gamora, but do you have anything a bit longer? It's very nice but I'm not really used to dressing like this, I prefer something I don't really have to worry about when I move."

"Of course, I'm sorry, I'll get you something else. You would be surprised how practical it is in a fight though, both for mobility and as a distraction."

"You can't deny she looks good in it though eh? I bet Thor prefers it to those jeans." Peter nudged Thor with his elbow.

There was a measurable drop in the cabin temperature as Thor turned a ten megavolt stare on Peter. "I should prefer it" he said slowly, in a voice that resonated though the ship. "if she were comfortable."

Drax shoved Peter out of the way and bowed to Jane. "My lady, please accept my humble apologies for my companion's stupidity. He was raised in a culture where the ritual denigration or objectification of women was considered a friendly overture to make toward a male with whom an alliance was desired, and his mind has proved too rigid to abandon this tradition in more civilized cultures. Should you wish to fight him to the death the bonds of our companionship would require me to act as his second, but I understand and accept that you would be within your rights to do so."

"Thank you Drax, I accept your apology and won't be duelling with Peter." said Jane with a straight face. "Besides I'm hardly dressed to fight someone to the death."

"I am certain that Gamora could obtain more combat appropriate clothing for you."

"Thanks but that won't be necessary. I would like some pants though, if you have them."

"Of course." said Gamora. "Peter, try not to say anything suicidally stupid while I'm gone." She spun on her heel and headed toward the bay door.

"You monkeys do know how to use a shower do you? Because I still smell alien." Rocket grumbled.

With a hiss a small worm that had been coiled around the ducting launched itself for Jane's face, its fanged maw flared. With balletic grace Gamora propelled herself off the cabin wall, spun midair and sliced it's head off with a pair of curved daggers that moved like extensions of her body. The severed head skidded across the deck towards Sylvie and Sayed, who shrieked and jumped backwards so quickly he lost his remaining shoe. Even as thick black fluid bled out the vicious fangs made short work of the trainer, before stilling after a final shudder.

Gamora sighed and cast a disgusted look at the carcass. "I can't believe I scrubbed that deck two cycles ago."

"Well it's not my turn to do it." snarled Rocket.

"No, Peter's next on the rota. Peter!" she stalked away to find him, a dripping knife in each hand.

Sayed remembered to breathe. "Do you remember we had those lists at university, of people we were allowed to sleep with if we ever met them?" he asked Sylvie urgently. "And I said if I ever met..."

"A Star Trek character in another universe."

"A Star Trek character in another universe, or a blue or green skinned alien girl, I was allowed to sleep with them?"

"Yes?" her voice was frosty.

"I don't want to do that anymore." said Sayed, slightly fearfully.

"Good choice dear." Sylvie patted him gently on the arm. "Good choice."


	8. Lost in Translation

The floor had been mopped, although not without a great deal of complaining on Peter's part, and dinner was served. The floating platform had been repurposed as a dining table although everyone was keeping a wary eye on the sputtering repulsor in the corner which threatened to dump the stew into Drax's lap.

"This is really good! What is it?" asked Jane, surprising her companions who found it rather bland and tasteless.

"Mostly protein concentrate and those weird ass space carrots Drax likes." replied Peter.

"You are mistaken my friend, they grow in J'fraxian space." explained Drax patiently. "Where is weird ass-space? I do not know that sector."

Peter facepalmed dramatically and gestured with his other hand. "You know what? Let's say it's over that way."

Drax looked puzzled "But that quadrant belongs to the..."

"Have you seen how much that guy is eating?" interrupted Rocket, who had been keeping an eye on Thor's plate "We should add that to their bill!" Gamora pointedly ignored him.

Thor and Groot were deep in conversation.

"I am Groot!"

"I am Thor."

"I am Groot?"

"I AM Thor."

"I, am Groot."

"I am Thor!"

"Excuse me, do you really have to say that?" interrupted Peter.

"Yes, zir language requires some sort of vocalization as a carrier medium for the psychic..."

"No, do you have to say that? The same sentence, over and over and over."

"What would you have me say instead?"

"I don't know! Literally anything would be less annoying! Recite poetry! Talk about what you had for breakfast! I don't know. Anything!"

Thor considered.

"Heyrða ek segja"

"I am, Groot!"

"í sögum fornum"

"I am? Groot."

"hvé mær of kom til Mornalands"

"I AM GROOT!"

"engi mátti fyr jörð ofan Heiðreks dóttur"

"I am Groot."

"hjalpir vinna."

"I, am Groot!"

"What are you reciting?" whispered Jane.

"Fanfiction."

"So how did you guys meet?" asked Sayed, who had planned out his smalltalk for the wedding and was determined to use it one way or the other.

Rocket waved a paw at Peter. "This idiot here had a bounty on his head, size you wouldn't believe, so Groot and I..."

Jane let her attention wander as the others took up the story, fascinated by how Groot seemed to be eating. Zie had placed one tiny gnarled hand into zir bowl, from which what seemed to be hairlike roots had grown. The level of stew was slowly sinking as zie absorbed it.

  "...encountered Gamora, who was previously Thanos's whore." continued Drax.

Jane's attention snapped back to the conversation. "Thor, did the translation program get that word right?" she asked with a frown.

"It did."

"Drax, do you know what the word 'whore' means?"

"Yes, it means one who fights for another's cause."

"You've been misinformed Drax. It's a word for sex-worker, an insulting word."

"Is this true?" asked Drax, turning to the rest of the Milano's crew. They all nodded, even Groot. "Why did none of you tell me this? I have no wish to use the wrong word, or to insult sex workers. Thank you Lady Jane, I am in your debt. If there is anyone you want slain my blade is at your service."

Jane smiled."No one for now. You're welcome Drax, I don't like it when people confuse me either."

"I thank you Lady Jane. You are wiser than other members of your species I have met, like Peter."

"Hey, you didn't need to make that explicit! Anyway I'm only half human, my father was..."

"It is true that you are only half human." interrupted Drax, considering. "Perhaps that that is why you are so much more stupid than her."

***

After the meal Jane and Thor found a corner to curl up in. It wasn't exactly private, Jane could see Gamora and Peter at the far end of the bay arguing over a chart, and hear Rocket swearing over something that kept sparking, but it was close enough and it had a porthole she could see the stars out of.

"Umm, I couldn't help noticing, you use 'zie' pronouns for Groot but everyone on the ship uses male pronouns for zem."

"I am sorry Jane, I sometimes forget you do not have Allspeak. The translation software on this ship is ancient and almost obsolete." he considered for a moment. "Also probably stolen. Groot's species is capable of producing both male and female flowers, and their concept of gender is very different to that of Earth. The pronouns I use for zir are correct in your language, but while the crew of this vessel also use the correct pronouns the software is rendering them incorrectly to your ears."

"So Allspeak means you always use the right pronouns for everyone?"

"Indeed."

"Wow, that's a really useful power! Does it happen automatically or do you have to think about it?"

"Automatically. I suppose it does make life considerably easier."

"So could you use the wrong pronouns if you wanted to, or does it happen whatever you do?"

"I could use an incorrect word if I wished, but why would I wish to misgender someone on purpose?"

"Good point. Huh, I never knew you could do that."

"I am glad that I am still capable of surprising you Jane, I would not wish you to become bored of me when we are married." he teased.

"I'd never get bored of you dummy, not even if I lived as long as...oh." Thor let out a breath that wasn't quite a sigh and leaned against her.

"I'm here now." she whispered, because what else was there to say? Thor buried his head in her neck, folded his warm heavy arms around her. They sat together in silence, watching the stars slip by.


	9. Works, meet spanner

There was an air of palpable frustration on Skuttlebutt's bridge. Bill had abandoned the command chair to pace, then abandoned pacing to sprawl on the floor next to Darcy, his head and as much of his shoulder as would fit in her lap. She ran soothing hands over his brow ridges. Clint had been distractedly juggling half a dozen of the warty blue-gray fruits he had found in the kitchen, but had now arranged them in a pyramid and was scowling at them as though they could tell him where Thor and the scientists had gone but were refusing to do so. Kate and America had retired to their quarters, while Sif was training on one of the lower decks, working out her impatience by making a punchbag rue the day it was stitched. Only Deadpool seemed calm, sprawled in the vacated command chair as he put the finishing touches to a Hello Kitty cross stitch while singing Katy Perry songs under his breath.

"Could you please shut up?" growled Clint.

"Would you prefer Taylor Swift?"

"I'd prefer to put an arrow through your neck but you'd bleed on Bill's upholstery."

"Everyone's a critic." Deadpool muttered.

"Wade, we're all rather worried at the moment, it just doesn't seem appropriate." Bill tried to explain.

"Why are you worried?"

Bill stared at him for long enough for the assassin to lose interest and go back to his cross stitch. "Because Thor, Jane and their friends are missing."

"Oh _that_. Don't worry they'll be fine, Stardust and Strawberries doesn't write deathfic." he started singing again.

Darcy sighed. "You know Clint, if you did want to shoot him I'm sure the drones would be happy to clean up."

"Yes we would be happy to provide cleaning assistance!" chirped the drone coiled around her wrist like a bangle.

"No one is attacking anyone on my bridge!" Bill growled. Skuttlebutt muttered [Except you, I doubt they could do as much damage as you managed] in his head then switched to using her speakers: "Transmission incoming!"

A gigantic disembodied eyeball appeared in the centre of the bridge. Everyone jumped back and even Deadpool stabbed himself in the finger with his needle.

"...already on, you don't need to..." came Thor's voice over the speakers.

"I know, I just wanted to see how it worked." Jane replied as the eyeball receded and shrank, becoming surrounded by a hologram of Jane's face and then her body. As she shrank down to life size Sylvie, Sayed and Thor's torso appeared beside her. Bill choked back a plaintive whine, as his animal instincts urged him to greet and rub his head against what his conscious mind knew was a hologram of his oath-brother. 

"Please Jane, never look straight into a holoprojector while it's switched on again." he gasped instead.

Deadpool was inspecting his cross-stitch scene critically. "You made me get blood all over the bits that weren't supposed to have blood on."

"Sorry!" said Jane. "Darcy? What are all you guys doing on Skuttlebutt?"

"Looking for you! We were trying to rescue you!" Darcy snapped.

Thor looked puzzled "While the incident with the worms was trying I do not think we were in any real danger at any point." he mused, fortunately drowning out Jane's exclamation of "With Wade and Clint?!?" Sayed and Sylvie gave him an incredulous look. 

"We were worried about you." growled Bill.

"We're your friends! Of course we were going to try and rescue you, you big, dumb...deity!" Darcy exploded. Thor had the good grace to look embarrassed.

Sif burst onto the bridge, closely followed by Kate and America.

"Norns' teats Thor, what in the nine realms possessed you..."

Bill raised a hand "Darcy's already done the shouting at him Sif."

The warrior turned to Darcy and raised a quizzical eyebrow. "Actually I was just getting warmed up, you can take it from here if you like." Darcy assured her.

"By Surtur's fiery crotch, by the withered profile of the Queen of Helheim, by the frost-encrusted ballsack of Lauffey himself..."(Deadpool pulled out a notepad and started taking notes)"...can you entertain the merest idea in that storm-addled skull of yours how concerned we have been?"

Jane raised a hand. "Umm, it was kind of my fault?"

"We were both in some measure responsible." said Thor hurriedly.

"Us too. We wanted to see space." said Sayed. "And we did! We saw another planet then got a lift from some aliens then I got rocket boots because an alien ate my trainers!" Sylvie placed a hand firmly on his shoulder before he could demonstrate them and hit his head on the ceiling for the third time in the past hour.

"And at no point did it occur to you to inform us that you were safe?" said Sif icily.

"Uh, we had no way of doing that till we reached Xandar, my phone's kind of powering a stolen Ravager ship at the moment. And when we got here we had to get shoes for Sayed and Thor had to find a bank and pay the Milano's crew, and then we had to find a holobooth..." Jane explained frantically. "Uh, Darcy? What's that on your shoulder?"

Darcy glanced at the drone clinging to her sweater.

"Haven't you met the Skuttlebots? This little guy's Drogon, the one on my wrist is called Rhaegal and this one in my hair is Viserion."

"We are here to assist!" chirped Drogon.

"They're cute aren't they? When we get back to Earth I'm going to set them up a playdate with Tony's bots."

"That's a terrible idea! Imagine how much damage they'd all do!"

"Sorry but the woman who managed to get herself lost in space at her own batchelorette party doesn't get to judge terrible ideas anymore!"

"We weren't lost! I knew exactly where we were! Just not how to get back."

"And now you are on Xandar?" asked Bill, already purring in anticipation of a reunion. Thor nodded. "Excellent, we should reach you within two Earth hours. From there we should be able to reach Asgard with time to spare." 

Deadpool fell off his chair laughing. "Do you guys really think you're going to be able to wrap this up in two chapters with no more complications? Oh that's cute." Everyone ignored him.

"Try not to blow any more holes in the space time continuum before we get there. Go get coffee or something. Maybe pancakes." said Darcy.

"So what was with all the lightning on Planet Brownnote?" ("We are NOT calling it that Clint." muttered Kate.) "Were you attacked?"

"It was..."

"A minor inconvenience." said Thor hastily, mindful of the continued frostiness of Sif's stare.

"And what happened to your favorite half of Thor?" Darcy asked Jane.

"Darcy! It's a small holobooth, he's leaning in through the curtain! And anyway I don't have a favorite half of Thor but if I did it'd be the top half! Because of his brain!" Jane squawked indignantly while Thor cracked up behind her.

"I'm in a holobooth. Isn't that incredible? Everything looks so real! It's like I could reach out and touch Darcy!" said Sayed, who matched his actions to his words. Darcy leaned backwards away from his hands, doing a passable impression of Keanu Reeves in the Matrix in the process.

"So. Pancakes." said Slyvie firmly.

"Can you recommend anywhere on Xandar Bill? You have visited more recently than I, I think." asked Thor.

"You know that street off Colonial Avenue where that tavern used to be, the one where you..." Bill saw Thor's expression and remembered that Jane was listening. "...the one where there used to be a tavern?"

Thor nodded, maintaining a carefully neutral expression.

"There's a cantina, on the lower walkway..."

"Excellent, we shall await you there. Farewell!" said Thor and cut the transmission before Bill could say anything more about their rather exuberant younger year.

There was a moment's silence after the hologram winked out, then Darcy plopped herself down in the now vacated command chair.

"So Bill, we have two hours. I think we need the story of Thor and The Tavern That Used To Be A Tavern "

***

"Welcome to Xandar. Please transfer control of your vessels thrusters to the docking AI." announced an alien-accented voice through Skuttlebutt's speakers. "Thank you. Please ensure that all disembarking passengers proceed to the decontamination station. Your vessel has been assigned to Bay 74a. Your embarking passengers are waiting on the lower gantry."

"Embarking passengers?" asked Bill. [Scanning now] replied Skuttlebutt. [There are three human life signatures in 74a.] she paused. [No Asgardians detected. I'll scan again].

"Bill?" asked Darcy.

"Docking clamps engaged. No harmful organisms detected in atmospheric sample. Equalising pressure. Please enjoy your stay." Bill was already running for the hatch, the others trying to keep up with varying degrees of success. He caught a distraught Jane in his arms as she burst in.

"Bill! I don't know what happened, Thor just disappeared!"

Deadpool doubled over, trying to catch his breath. "Why. Does. No one. Listen. To. Me." he wheezed.


	10. Chapter 10

They cleared immigration much faster the second time, which Sylvie suspected had something to do with the huge and obviously impatient predatory cyborg accompanying them this time. No one had wanted to be left behind on the ship; indeed Skuttlebutt herself had only been dissuaded from a diplomatic incident-provoking fly by by Bill's promise to let her access his senses whenever she wanted. It was therefore a motley crew that walked (or in Sayed's case, hovered uncertainly) up to the cantina off Colonial Avenue.

Bill hesitated at the threshold, his tongue flicking in and out as he tasted the air. "Something smells very wrong in this place..." he began, then stopped at the sight of the scene in front of him. A portly Krylorian woman was crouched by the table they had been seated at, tugging at Mjolnir where it had been abandoned earlier. With a cry of horror he bounded across the room and snatched it up.

"Where is he?" he demanded, unable to keep the snarl out of his voice.  
   
"Who?" the woman snapped, drawing herself up to her full height and staring him straight in the sternum. Her enormous holographic earrings shook angrily as she spoke. "And I don't know how much that thing weighs but if it's damaged my floor you'll be paying for it." she added, brushing dust off her knees before rounding on Jane, Sylvie and Sayed. "And I'm glad you decided to come back to pay your bill, I don't like involving things the Nova Corp at the best of times but since they've been so short staffed I'd be lucky if they responded this week." She scowled at Jane as though she had been personally responsible for the Kree invasion of Xandar.

Bill was too stunned to answer, just staring blankly at the hammer in his hand as though he'd never seen it before.

"I'm so sorry, I didn't think, when Thor didn't come back I just wanted to find Bill and..." Jane panicked.

Bill recovered himself slightly. "We are obviously happy to pay any charges incurred, but we are here to search for our friend..." He was distracted enough to try and hand Mjolnir to Kate as he searched for his wallet. Only her martial-artist's reflexes saved her from losing a foot as it plummeted through her grip to the floor, cracking the plastoleum.

"And then there'll be the charges for that."

Sif decided it was time she took control of the situation.

"The man who was dining with my companions has disappeared, and not we suspect of his own volition. Large, taller than me, humanoid with hair the colour of your sun. We wish to see any recording you may have made, so discover why he did not return. Will you show them to us?"

"And we'll pay for the meal. And the damages." added Jane.

Madam Vahl opened her mouth to protest then realized that she was that two members of the party she was addressing had swords on their backs and one was an enormous, fierce-looking armored alien holding a warhammer, and that more importantly this large and obviously upset group of beings was upsetting her paying customers. "Kri'ik! Take front of house for a moment!" she snapped instead. "You won't all fit, some of you will need to wait outside on the street." She spun on her heel, and marched away, not waiting to see who followed. Jane, Bill and Sif immediately started after her.

"I want to go with Jane, but maybe you should wait?" said Sylvie, secretly concerned about everyone's safety if her husband brought his rocket boots into what was apparently a cramped space. Sayed looked ready to protest, but eventually nodded reluctantly, recognising her closer bond with Jane. "Coming?" she asked Darcy, and the two of them scurried after their friend.

"I guess we should wait out here if there's no room." said Kate to the others. America looked like she wanted to punch something but reluctantly agreed, shuffling out of the cantina beside Clint. Deadpool hesitated for a moment, then decided things were likely to be more interesting inside and followed the others through a swinging door to a cluttered desk in the corner of the kitchen, helping himself to something green with tentacles off a chopping board as he passed.

The holographic footage hanging in the air at the centre of the little cluster showed a blue-skinned woman in a gray jumpsuit vaporising the remaining crumbs on the table before Jane's party sat down. Madame Vahl fast forwarded the image as the waitress returned with drinks and took their orders.

Wade's snack proved to be rather more alive than he'd expected, springing out of his hand and wrapping its tentacles around his head. He attempted to dislodge it by hitting himself in the face with a heavy metal pan. The chefs working in the kitchen exchanged weary looks, as one wondering why they'd decided to come to Xandar where this sort of thing happened every other day.

The holographic waitress returned with Jane, Sylvie and Sayed's meals, then clapped her hands. Some sort of robotic gurney lowered Thor's enormous platter onto the table. Madame Vahl hit fast forward again as the images ate and talked.

Deadpool's snack had now stolen the pan and escaped onto the ceiling with it, where it was clinging to a light fixture and brandishing it threateningly. He attempted to shoot it down with various condiments in squirt bottles.

The holographic images finished their meals. The tall Centaurian waitress in the green dress cleared Jane's goblet then rested a hand on Thor's shoulder as she leaned forward to speak to him. He followed her to the back of the cantina while the others remained chatting at the table, and disappeared from view. The others continues talking for a while, then slowly realised first that Thor was taking a very long time then that he didn't seem to be coming back. The recording was fast forwarded again through their increasingly frantic search and eventual departure. The Centaurian waitress didn't reappear either.

"That's a very short dress the waitress was wearing." mused Deadpool, who was capable of recognising when a worthy adversary had defeated him and abandoned his attempts to incorporate the creature into a burrito.

Darcy groaned. "Seriously Wade, this isn't the time."

"No no, it's a short dress for a tall woman like that to wear. That's all I'm saying. I wonder if she was that tall when she put it on."

Sif gave him a strange look. "There may be some truth in what you suggest, if she could abduct him..."

"That's Larissa. She's a good girl, very hard working usually but no one's seen her this afternoon." Madam Vahl said, scowling at them. "In fact it's more likely that HE made off with HER!" She stabbed at the console with her finger causing the image to shift, displaying the back of the cantina. Ignoring the counter Larissa and Thor linked arms and entered the back corridor. Another shift in perspective and they exited the cantina via the back door.

"There you see? Nothing sinister. Waste of a good waitress but it happens everyday." the Krylorian snapped.

"No but you don't understand! We were about to get married!" Jane protested.

Madam Vahl's stance softened fractionally as she turned to face Jane. "You're young still sweetheart but you'll learn. People make a habit of disappointing you. I know it hurts now but I promise you, pretty little thing like you'll have no trouble finding someone who won't run off with the first little bit of skirt to offer him food."

Bill had seemed distracted for a while, pacing back and forth and sniffing the air. Darcy put her hand on Jane's shoulder to try and contain the inevitable explosion, but before it came he headed for a metal door on the far side of the room. He paused for a moment, licked the metal, then simply tore the door and its frame out of the wall.

"You will be paying for that!" shrieked Madam Vahl, charging forward then freezing in the opening. The others crowded forward to see what was inside.

It was some sort of store room, the walls covered in shelving on which crates of vegetables and jars of misshapen objects floating in pickling liquid rested. But what had arrested Madam Vahl's attention was lying on the floor, dripping blue blood onto her gray jumpsuit.

"Someone call the Nova Meds!" screamed Madam Vahl as Sif shoved Bill aside to tend to Larissa.


End file.
